If, by chance, anyone still checks this thread I’d like to offer my memories of the Parochial League in the early to mid 1960s. I stumbled across this blog when I read in a recent Sunday paper that Gene Fisch was conducting a lecture at a local library. As a Grammar school kid in the early 1960s I would travel from Rosary to the Hearts to watch the Wizard weave his magic. Like other kids in grade school, I wanted to be the next Gene Fisch , an unattainable objective for most of us. I then went to the internet to research Gene‘s life trail after NYU. I had lost track of his his career after watching a few televised NYU games. I found this thread which is , without doubt, the best I’ve seen.
In my opinion, the Parochial League, with basketball was its nucleus, was a culture unto itself. I graduated from Rosary in 1965 and played ball as a “Rodney Dangerfield Guard.” By that I mean that I shared the position with the great Bill Schmidt, a three year starter and ( at least ) a two year first team All Parochial. Bill never met a shot he didn’t like to take, and he made most of them; hence my unremarkable scoring average. The other starters my Senior year were Noel Byrne , Jimmy Horton and Jim ( Brigham) Young. We were coached by the great Billy Hassett, who played his ball at Notre Dame and then for the Milwaukee Lakers. My career lowlights included attempting to guard Bob Bregard, one of the best gunners ever, being intimidated by a seemingly endless horde of Evangelist Juniors ( we all know who they were) and having the ball stolen by Jimmy Grooms ( Baptist) while I was bringing the ball down court by myself. That ignominy occurred during a playoff game at Hearts ( neutral courts were the playoff venues ) and I wanted to run, in uniform, out of the gym and hide under my bed for eternity.
After graduation I headed East along the Thruway to Siena, where I found that a number of Parochial ball players had preceded me by a year. The Sophomores were Tony Marsello ( St. Vincents ), John Michalic ( St. Anthony’s), Jerry Pollock ( MHR) and Pat Cain and Bob Maroney ( Pats ) . Other Rosary hoopers who later attended Siena were Noel Byrne , Tom Joyce and TJ Sheridan, all Siena ball players.
Those were the days when Parochial dads would return from WW2 and settle back in their old neighborhoods to raise a family. Many of my buddies’ fathers went to Rosary with my father, who was a multi year All Parochial.
When I refer to the PL culture, I am reminded of the friendships developed with ball players from the other schools. Warm Summer nights would find guys from other Catholic schools invading our Upper Onondaga park for hoops. Lose one game and your team would would have quite a bit of time to rest. A pickup game at the Y would often find me with my Vincents’ friend, Billy Shaw.
One highlight was when the late, great Joe Mulherin ( Baptist, 1964 )would showcase his magnificent talents at Onondaga. Joe later became a Marine, took enemy shrapnel in his leg in Vietnam, and returned home to start for Lemoyne, playing with kids five to eight years younger. Anyone who wouldn’t melt with patriotism after hearing his story of strength and determination would have to have a heart of stone. On other post High School evenings we’d find ourselves spinning exaggerated tales of our hoop prowress with other PL buddies at Garzone’s ( every Thursday) and the Poor House West.
We enjoyed the after game dances and I managed to go out with a Baptist girl for awhile until she, like many others, gave me my walking papers. As I used to say about the girls who dumped me..“ Their name is legion.” We also tried to clumsily ply our negligible charms on the Italian girls with the big hair at the dances at Belle Hall , near Assumption. Those were the days when you could address your buddy as Pollock, Mick, Kraut and Dago and no one would be offended. When past Mayor Tom Young ( Pats, 1965) joked that we Rosarians were “ snobs on the hill”, no one was offended . After all, we (geographically at least) looked down on the unwashed masses that were our Parochial brethren. Besides, we certainly weren’t about to boycott Coleman’s.
I could go on but, at this juncture I didn’t want to make this post too long. Yes, I remember all the bars mentioned in this thread, the Elmwood Animals , Sandy Pond, etc., but that’s for another musing. I have often thought that the history of the Parochial League must be told. The hoopsters of the Greatest Generation are playing at the next level at an accelerated pace and we need to reduce their memories to writing. Any interest out there ?
To digress, as for the comments about Andy Dobreski, he started for Rosary as a Freshman and transferred to Central.
.
